Designation for 'a special part of world'

Visitors to Asheville lured to our fair city by a thriving craft brewing industry that has resulted in multiple designations as "Beer City USA" might hit town these days and think that another municipal signage mishap has occurred. Not to worry - this is not a matter of the ''r'' peeling away from the sign like the vinyl on those ill-fated way-finding markers purchased by the Tourism Development Authority a few years back.

The newly planted placard proclaiming that Asheville is "Bee City USA" is right on the honey?, er right on the money. Thanks to the enterprising efforts of a locally based organization called the Center for Honeybee Research, Asheville is officially named the nation's inaugural "Bee City USA."

The group of Western North Carolina beekeepers became alarmed at dramatically declining populations of bees, which are primarily responsible for pollinating the plants that provide the nation's fruits, vegetables and grains. To help draw attention to the importance of bees in the ecosystem and to reward those towns that meet a series of standards designed to help protect honeybees and other pollinators, the research center developed the Bee City USA program.

And what better place to reveal the template than right here at home? That was the thinking of Phyllis Stiles, director and founder of Bee City USA. "We live in a real special part of the world where we have very committed beekeepers," Stiles says.

A small crowd of around 30 people swarmed to downtown Asheville near the City/County Plaza last Monday to watch the ceremonial unveiling of the Bee City USA sign. And while some cynics have downplayed the event as tantamount to winning a contest that nobody else bothered to enter, we think the increased attention being brought to the plight of the honeybee is to be commended.

Experts point to the dramatic and mysterious decimation of bees - especially honeybees - from the American landscape over the past several years, a phenomenon known as "colony collapse disorder." Scientists blame a combination of factors for the problem, including habitat loss, increased use of pesticides, viruses, bacteria and a parasitic mite.

Pesticides and habitat loss in particular are a focus of the efforts of the local honeybee research group. "We believe that it's important to enhance pollinator habitat," Stiles says. "That means we use pesticides as carefully as we can, preferably not at all."

It's easy enough to shrug off a dwindling bee population as signaling nothing more than a few less buzzing insects at your backyard barbeque or a drop in the likelihood of getting stung while weed-whacking around the flowering bushes. But when you stop to smell the roses and consider that bees are necessary to pollinate those roses - not to mention the crops that supply food for much of the world - the value of bees to humankind comes into sharper focus.

That's why the Center for Honeybee Research was founded in 2011, says director Carl Chesick, who has called Asheville home for more than 30 years. "The bees are really important to people, and if the bees can't make it in this world, people aren't going to be able to make it either," Chesick says. "We want the center to be the world hub for all things 'bee,' and it's a pretty grandiose goal, but I think it's reachable."

The group is off to an admirable start, winning the approval of Asheville City Council for the Bee City designation in July of last year. Officials from several other towns and cities have contacted the group seeking information about how to earn the title, which requires the endorsement of a set of standards "for creating sustainable habitats for pollinators."

The key word there is "pollinators." Although the designation is Bee City USA, the program also stresses the importance of other plant pollinators, including wasps, yellow jackets, butterflies, moths, hummingbirds and even bats. Obviously, Pollinator City USA doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

So, Bee City USA it is, right alongside Beer City USA. Although we do find ourselves wondering if perhaps the local root vegetable farmers might have another designation in mind for our city in the future. Beet City USA, anyone?

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Designation for 'a special part of world'

Visitors to Asheville lured to our fair city by a thriving craft brewing industry that has resulted in multiple designations as 'Beer City USA' might hit town these days and think that another